The Australian heartthrob died of an apparent overdose; the masseuse who discovered the body called TV actress Mary-Kate Olsen before 911. Three times. "No one ever really dies," said Britney Spears, a troubled pop star for whom many news organizations, caught off guard by recent celebrity deaths, had already prepared obituaries. Fox News' John Gibson found humor the death of an actor who had once played — titter — a gay cowboy. That movie, Brokeback Mountain, jumped into Amazon.com's top 25 DVDs, but Ledger's disconsolate fans preferred the actor's lighter fare, such as A Knight's Tale.

The Fox shockjock's ultimate boss, Roger Ailes, can breathe a little easier: News Corporation paid over $10m to shut up the star of its books division, who had evidence of a political cover-up. That won't help the campaign of Rudy Giuliani, who was savaged in his home-town newspaper, the New York Times. Hillary Clinton, the strongest presidential candidate, showed her feminine side, gingerly, by posing for Harper's Bazaar, but only in a spread with some of her male rivals.

Some Spanish speakers may have been confused by this week's news. On Google "Heath Ledger is dead" was translated as "Tom Cruise is dead." The star of the Mission Impossible movies may be heading that way, at the box office. The video interview in which Cruise raves about Scientology has been seen by millions, and has spawned countless spoofs; it has metastasized into the popular culture. Cruise will never be seen merely as an actor again; more as a zealot. The sect tried to shut down pages containing its secret videos, but it met its match in a new and amorphous enemy. A group of hackers calling themselves Anonymous declared war on the "cult" with a cyber-attack that overwhelmed Scientology websites. For these and other top stories from the week, click http://gawker.com/tag/top.

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